Some years ago when I was in Ireland we had a long phone conversation about “Springfarm”, where I grew up, and the location for your book “The Lady”. A cousin of mine, who also grew up on the property, and our grandfather, apparently had a paranormal experience there in the 1920s. It involved the sighting of a coach and horses drawing up by the house. I wonder if, during the course of your researches, whether you encountered any reference to such a phenomenon?

Hope all goes well at “Dragonhold”!

Anne’s response:

To reply about Springfarm,

When I was trying to buy and got overbid past what I could financially handle, I never heard anything about phantom, or real, coaches. I did know that another house nearby had a real spook, a former owner, a clergyman who had suicided and in the bedroom could be seen and heard by his relative. The kids living in the house often heard him and would never go upstairs alone after dark.

When I settled up the Kilquade road into the 1st Dragonhold, I did have an experience, not with a ghost exactly, but on a clear night we would hear the odd tones of men speaking quietly around a fire and the stamp of their bridled horses tied up in picket. It sort of amused me, but Todd kept a baseball bat handy. Then one clear night in October, we heard a lot more movement and Todd went out the front door and my Jan (who is Lessa) went out the back, both having heard the same noises and deciding to check. They met halfway behind the house near the stables and they could still hear the noise. Todd decided that what we heard was Cromwell’s soldiers bivouacked below Altador, still in their seige. And sometime later the noises stopped entirely, so the enemies had left… again.

The current Dragonhold was built on so-far calm grounds but I never heard more from the Springfarm folk. So banshees, at any rate!